[Bf-committers] render passes & workflow

[Ton Roosendaal]

Hi,

Now that the basic code work was done, it's time to check on usablity  
of pass rendering.
(No Trip, not usuability of compositor, that's another project!).

Two ideas I got in mind now:

1 Make the "Combined" pass (optional) exclusive passes.

My assumption is that you only use passes for specific cases, like only  
the shadow pass or only the reflection pass. In that case, a composite  
now is difficult to use when "Combined" has this pass info added (for  
example blurring shadow).

2 Give RenderLayers two new options:
   - Light (Group) override
   - Material (incl Node tree) override

This option will render everything in the RenderLayer with a specific  
group of Lamps, and/or with a specific Material. That's a much more  
powerful way than define a "custom pass", since then you have the the  
RenderLayer result again with all existing passes available.
It also gives a nice use for the to-be-added Python Node shaders. :)

-Ton-

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Ton Roosendaal  Blender Foundation ton at blender.org  
http://www.blender.org